For an instant she
planned to become and to be all he could wish her; to change her
very nature for him. And then a great gush of pride came over
her, and she set her teeth tight together, and determined that he
should either love her as she was or not at all. Unless he could
take her with all her faults, she would not care for his regard;
"love" was too noble a word to call such cold, calculating
feeling as his must be, who went about with a pattern idea in his
mind, trying to find a wife to match. Besides, there was
something degrading, Jemima thought, in trying to alter herself
to gain the love of any human creature. And yet, if he did not
care for her, if this late indifference were to last, what a
great shroud was drawn over life! Could she bear it?
From the agony she dared not look at, but which she was going to
risk encountering, she was aroused by the presence of her mother.
"Jemima! your father wants to speak to you in the dining-room."
"What for?" asked the girl.
"Oh! he is fidgeted by something Mr. Farquhar said to me and
which I repeated. I am sure I thought there was no harm in it,
and your father always likes me to tell him what everybody says
in his absence."
Jemima went with a heavy heart into her father's presence.
He was walking up and down the room, and did not see her at
first.
"O Jemima! is that you? Has your mother told you what I want to
speak to you about?"
"No!" said Jemima.
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